STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
The United States won more gold medals at the Winter Olympics than ever before. Americans captured 12, including one for hockey, the first in 46 years. NPR correspondents Becky Sullivan and Pien Huang followed all of the Olympic action for us, and they join us now from Milan and Verona. Welcome to you both.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: Buongiorno, Steve.
PIEN HUANG, BYLINE: Hey.
INSKEEP: Buongiorno, thank you so much. It's really great. What was it like, Becky, to be in the arena for that hockey game?
SULLIVAN: Yeah. Steve, it was amazing. Just an incredible game, top to bottom. And I honestly can't believe the Americans won because Canada looked better, I thought, especially in the second and third periods, where they were just driving over and over again, their top line of the stars Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon and Macklin Celebrini. Honestly, every time they were on ice, it made the USA sort of look like a JV squad, except, of course, for the American hero. That's goaltender Connor Hellebuyck, who normally plays for the Winnipeg Jets. I mean, his performance was just a highlight reel of save after save, 41 in total, including one I think you've probably seen a photo of maybe, a behind-the-back stick save off a shot from the Canadian Devon Toews.
And then in overtime, it was the forward, Jack Hughes, who had the game-winner. And this was actually just minutes after he had taken a stick hard to the face, which had chipped his front tooth, bloodied his mouth, and he won it anyway. He'd lost a tooth before, after - you know, after the game, he said he'd lost a tooth before but not like this. Here's how he put it.
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JACK HUGHES: My first thought was, draw the penalty. Actually, my first thought was - I looked down the ice and saw my teeth.
INSKEEP: Ow.
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HUGHES: I was like, here we go again. So I know the last time that happened, it wasn't very fun.
SULLIVAN: Anyway, just tremendous. As you say, first in 46 years, a gold medal for the U.S. men's hockey team, last one, of course, being the Miracle on Ice back in 1980.
INSKEEP: Maybe the most mind-blowing part of that clip you just played is the last time that happened, he says.
SULLIVAN: Well, that's a hockey player for you.
INSKEEP: It's just a thing that happens in hockey. It's true. So where did politics come into this, given that, of course, President Trump has gone so hard against Canada for the past year?
SULLIVAN: Yeah. You know, this rivalry between these two teams - U.S and Canada -has been pretty politicized over the last year since Trump came back into office. You had - you might remember, there were a couple games between the two teams this time last year, where you had Canadian fans booing "The Star-Spangled Banner," American fans doing the reverse. And so, you know, the White House, no surprise, is yet again leaning into the imagery from this game. They tweeted a photo of a bald eagle attacking a Canada goose.
You also had the FBI director, Kash Patel, who is a big hockey fan, who attended the game. He was in Milan. Video showed him in the locker room afterward, wearing a USA jersey, celebrating with players, drinking beer. An FBI spokesperson had said earlier this week that it was not a personal trip, that it was a work trip, that he had meetings here in Milan. But, yeah, he was in the locker room after the game. President Trump called the team. The video shows Kash Patel holding the phone. That video was retweeted by an official White House Twitter account. And you could hear President Trump inviting the team to his State of the Union address on Tuesday night.
Of course, the U.S. women's hockey team also won the gold medal here at these Olympics. They beat Canada in their own big achievement. That was on Thursday. And in the call with the men's team, you can hear Trump make a joke that he'll have to invite the women too, or else he'll be impeached. So we'll see who shows up at the address tomorrow night.
INSKEEP: OK, a couple of gold medals there. Pien Huang, how does this fit in with all the other gold medals the Americans won?
HUANG: Yeah. So, I mean, the previous record before these games was 10 gold medals for the U.S., set in 2002 in Salt Lake City. And this time, the U.S. set a new record, a dozen, with help from freestyle skiers who won in moguls, aerials and halfpipe. And it was also helped by some repeat winners, like figure skater Alysa Liu, who won a team gold and an individual medal, and also speed skater Jordan Stolz, who won two golds by himself.
INSKEEP: That Alysa Liu triumph - that was really something to see.
HUANG: It was.
INSKEEP: And what about the speed skating? What do you think of the performances there?
HUANG: Oh, it was incredible, Steve. I mean, I spent a lot of time at the speed-skating track here and saw Olympic records getting set night after night. All of the Olympic records that were broken in these games were in speed skating, two in short track, seven in long. And Kjeld Nuis, a Dutch long-track skater who won the bronze medal in the 1,500 meter, said that he was surprised that the ice was so dialed in in a temporary rink.
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KJELD NUIS: I wouldn't have thought it would be so fast, these Olympics. I think every athlete really peaked to this event and is in the shape of his life. That's the only reason that I could give.
HUANG: And then, Steve, the Dutch are so good in the sport. They care the most about speed skating, and you can see it in the sea of spectators wearing orange at the rink. But there were champions from Czechia, China, Italy and the U.S. as well. I mean, the U.S. speed-skating phenomenon Jordan Stolz had come in wanting to medal in each of his four events. He's leaving with three medals, two gold and one silver. He's also 21 and has years ahead of him for speed skating if he wants to. And in these Games, he was credited by his competitors with elevating the field and pushing them to train harder and skate faster.
INSKEEP: Becky, this has been such an eventful Games that it seems like a long time ago that we were focused on women's alpine skiing...
SULLIVAN: Yeah.
INSKEEP: ...And drama there.
SULLIVAN: Without a doubt, yeah. It was one of the very first big stories of the Games, that we all watched Lindsey Vonn step up to the start house at the top of the downhill race. She, of course, was in the middle of an amazing comeback out of retirement. She's 41. And then she came to this downhill race. It had been her goal to ski in Cortina, and she had this tragic crash just 12, 13 seconds into her run, had to be airlifted off the course. She's now home here in the U.S., recovering.
And then, of course, on the flip side, too, at Cortina, we saw an Olympic gold for Mikaela Shiffrin. She's the other big U.S. skiing star. She won the Slalom race, which was a huge show of redemption and perseverance for her, because you might remember, Steve, that she missed out on the podium entirely back in 2022. It was a huge shock, stunning story of that game. She has since said that she was still embroiled in grief over her father's unexpected passing. And I think it just takes serious dedication to work through something like that, keep at it for four more years and amazing to see it all pay off with the reward of a gold medal.
INSKEEP: OK, Pien, you get to wrap us up by wrapping us up. What were the closing ceremonies like?
HUANG: They were incredible, Steve. I mean, it was in an old coliseum from 30 A.D., a space that gladiators used to fight in. And it was much more relaxed than the opening ceremony. I mean, athletes were wearing more comfortable clothes. There were confetti cannons. There was a DJ set by Major Lazer, Diplo telling us all to dance. And afterwards, there were just a bunch of athletes heading up the McDonald's. We saw cross-country skier Johannes Klaebo from Norway, who won six gold medals here, the most of any athlete ever in the Winter Games. And he was there with his teammates putting in a big order for chicken wings.
SULLIVAN: (Laughter).
HUANG: So it just was really great to see athletes celebrating, relaxing, looking fully human after their incredible feats here at the Games.
INSKEEP: I want to quote you. You said, telling us all to dance. The DJ was telling you to dance. Did you dance?
HUANG: The whole crowd at the coliseum here, yeah.
INSKEEP: OK, NPR's Pien Huang in Verona and Becky Sullivan in Milan. Thanks to you both for your coverage.
SULLIVAN: You're so welcome.
HUANG: Thank you.
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